Stu Bracegirdle was eight when he skinned his first possum. Not quite six decades later, he's still at it.
Photo: RNZ/Carol Stiles
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In Stu's heyday, he could whip the skins off 300 possums in a morning.
"I probably had the biggest factory in New Zealand for dealing with possums. We did 180,000 skins one winter through here."
In 1984, Stu, who is from Inglewood in Taranaki, broke the New Zealand record for skinning a possum – it took him 12.3 seconds.
A year or so later, he did it in 'eight and a bit'.
"But the head come off, so I got disqualified so it's just luck of the draw, eh."
Hand-plucked possum fur Photo: RNZ/Carol Stiles
Today, Stu buys possums for their fur and skins and, if they're fresh enough, for pet food.
He pays $5 for a head shot or trapped possum.
And, now that already plucked possum fur is worth $120 a kilogram, he has possumers beating a path to his door.
"I've got a guy coming in next week with 50-odd kilos."
Machine-plucked possum fur Photo: RNZ/Carol Stiles
Possums have been good to Stu, he says.
"I just love possums... It's like a disease... it's in me blood. And when we go away in the motorhome I've got a couple of bags and I'll pick up all the roadies."
Even the semi-squashed ones.
"If they're too bad, no, but most of them are all right. Like, we went to Whangārei to the national (motorhome) rally at the long weekend and there were so many up there dead on the road. But we would've been away from home too long and they would have gone off in the motorhome so they got left," he says with a laugh.
Stu also has a pet possum he has raised since she was a baby. Aptly, her name is 'Lucky'.